Not all attempts to make wordcraft measurable are sensible. Under Sam Zell, Tribune newspapers are counting words, coming up with the laughable result that Hartford Courant reporters are worth more than their counterparts at the Los Angeles Times. The last thing publishers should be doing is setting up systems that reward the mindless gushing of words. (Gawker Media, the publisher of Valleywag, pays writers a set monthly fee, with a bonus that varies with the number of pageviews their items generate.)

The Bloomberg way — "first word, future word, factual word, fastest word, final word" — emphasizes speed and accuracy in evaluating its reporters. (Some aspects of the news operation's culture may be shifting under new editorial leader Norm Pearlstine, but it's hard to see those basics changing.) News has value when it is actually new, and helps Bloomberg's customers make money.

And for all that, Bloomberg News is a relatively small part of Bloomberg's value proposition. Far more important are the prices that Bloomberg's terminals flash across traders' screens. News stories, in this scenario, are just one more commodity.

Not all journalism lends itself to such coldhearted analysis. Political reportage is a vital public service and, in the absence of local newspapers, it is hard to imagine how it will get funded. (Ironic that Michael Bloomberg, the company's founder, is now New York's mayor.) But it's hard to understand why business reporters, of all people, complain when their chosen career is treated like, well, a business. Merrill Lynch's pending sale of its stake in Bloomberg points to a future when the news is worth more, and those who write it, only as much as their last story. Depressing? Only to journalism careerists.

He was delicious.

Earlier: The Editor-in-Chief Is Dead! Long Live the Editor-in-Chief!

We're told the installation occurred before an elite audience of a few hundred top Time Warner execs, including the half-dozen or so top editors from most Time Inc. magazines. But we don't know what actually transpired there, as the ritual is otherwise so shrouded in secrecy that we imagine it somewhat akin to the Great Food Offering rite performed by newly enthroned Japanese emperors, which is also believed to carry a sexual element of commune with the ancestral Sun Goddess, and is thus what prevents Japan from permitting an empress. (It's worth noting here — to extend this gratuitous and unfounded implication — that Time Inc. has never had a female editor-in-chief.)

We do know this, though: There was some pretty amazing swag, several fabulous pieces of which we got our hands on.

We found most intriguing these hunks of milk chocolate emblazoned with the likenesses of both outgoing Great Leader and incoming Dear Leader. Presented in a Godiva-like golden gift box, they're the perfect holiday gift for the sweet-toothed magazine editor or media reporter on your list. We'd like to report that they're delicious, too, but we have no idea. We wouldn't dare eat them until we receive a personal waiver from our double-super-secret Time Inc. source.

There's more after the jump, including a keychain baring both men's faces — a perfect gift for your favorite close-night car-service driver! — and, perhaps best, a heat-sensitive coffee mug that, when filled, magically reveals Time Inc.'s future.

Two sides of the keychain:

Two angles of the coffee mug:

The mug being filled with boiling water:

(Pearlstine, inexplicably, remains visible on the other side. Must represent his "senior advisor" deal.)

The Times, which emphasizes that the switch will likely be imperceptible to Time Incers and Time Inc. readers, both because that's how the company likes to do things and because the two have already achieved such mind meld, nevertheless provides 2,000 words on just how great Huey is. (He's down to earth! He likes editing magazines! He doesn't fly company planes anymore!)

There's also a Time Inc. press release — with some shockingly bad copy editing ("John Huey, Jr."? "recently-announced"?) — after the jump.

The Torch Is Passed at the House of Luce [NYT]

For Immediate Release

Norman Pearlstine to Step Down as Time Inc. Editor-in-Chief;
Editorial Director John Huey to Become Company s 6th Editor-in-Chief

October 17, 2005 — Norman Pearlstine, Time Inc. s editor-in-chief since January 1995, will step down on December 31, and editorial director John Huey, Jr. will succeed him at that time as the company s sixth editor-in-chief, it was announced today by Ann Moore, chairman & CEO of Time Inc.

Pearlstine, 63, will remain with Time Warner as a senior advisor and will work on his recently-announced book, OFF THE RECORD: The Use and Misuse of Anonymous Sources, to be published in 2007. During his eleven years as editor-in-chief, he is credited with reinvigorating Time Inc. s core titles while launching a steady stream of successful new ones. Last year The American Society of Magazine Editors gave him its Lifetime Achievement Award and inducted him into the Magazine Editors Hall of Fame.

Huey, 57, has been editorial director of Time Inc. since 2001, overseeing its weekly magazines Time, Sports Illustrated, People, Entertainment Weekly and Life, as well as the company s business and personal finance titles, including Fortune, Money and Business 2.0. Previously, he was the managing editor of Fortune since 1995, and was named Editor of the Year by both Advertising Age and Adweek, and was listed as one of the Top 10 Magazine Editors in the Country by the Columbia Journalism Review.

In a note to Time Inc. staff, Moore said: Norm has presided over the single most dynamic journalistic period in Time Inc. s history. He has enabled our remarkably diverse collection of editorial cultures to each speak with its own voice and connect with its readers. And he s been the standard bearer for the larger ideals of this company by keeping our editors focused on their duty to report all sides of every story — fairly, objectively and accurately.

She continued, As much as I will miss everything Norm has brought to the table at Time Inc., I am energized by the prospect of John taking the editorial helm of our company. In his 17 years here, he has been an unflagging champion of quality magazine making. He is highly focused on keeping all our readers engaged. And he has a strong track record of choosing winning editorial talent to lead our magazines. What's more, he couldn t be better suited for the climate of change our industry is in today. He thrives on change. I know this is going to be great fun for John, for me and for Time Inc.

In addition to managing the editorial side of Time Inc., Pearlstine has also overseen the business side of Time Inc. International, as well as the company s online and television operations from 1996-1998. Prior to joining Time Inc., Pearlstine spent 23 years at Dow Jones & Company, including nine years as managing editor of The Wall Street Journal and executive editor of the news division. He was also the Journal's Tokyo bureau chief, the first managing editor of The Asian Wall Street Journal and the first editor and publisher of The Wall Street Journal/Europe. After leaving the Journal in 1992, he spent a year launching SmartMoney magazine for Dow Jones.

In 1989, Pearlstine received the National Press Foundation s Editor of the Year Award, and he was honored with the Loeb Lifetime Achievement Award for Distinguished Business and Financial Journalism in 2000. Pearlstine is president of the Atsuko Chiba Foundation, which provides scholarships to Asian journalists for study in the U.S. He also serves on the boards of the Carnegie Corporation, the Annenberg School of Communications at the University of Southern California, the Committee to Protect Journalists, the Arthur F. Burns Fellowship Program and the Tribeca Film Institute. He is president of the Advisory Board of the Nieman Foundation at Harvard University, a member of the Advisory Board of the City University of New York s Graduate School of Journalism and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

A native of Atlanta, Huey graduated from the University of Georgia and served in the U.S. Navy as an intelligence officer before embarking on his journalistic career at a small weekly newspaper, the DeKalb New Era. He worked briefly at the Atlanta Constitution before joining the Dallas bureau of The Wall Street Journal in 1975. After a stint as the Journal s Atlanta bureau chief, Huey moved to Brussels in 1982 to help launch the Journal s European edition as its founding managing editor and later its editor.

Huey joined Fortune in 1988. In 1989, he was founding editor of Southpoint Magazine, a Time Inc. regional monthly that folded in 1990. In 1992, he co-authored Sam Walton:Made in America, the autobiography of late founder of Wal-Mart, which was on The New York Times best-seller list for several months.

Time Inc. is the world s leading magazine publisher, publishing 155 titles that are read more than 300 million times worldwide on a monthly basis, and account for nearly a quarter of the total advertising revenues of U.S. consumer magazines.

Time Inc. is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Time Warner Inc., a leading media and entertainment company, whose businesses include interactive services, cable systems, filmed entertainment, television networks and publishing.

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